


No less for the lack of them

by Aethelar



Category: Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (Movies)
Genre: Asexual Character, character piece
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-24
Updated: 2019-10-24
Packaged: 2021-01-02 10:13:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,094
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21159971
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aethelar/pseuds/Aethelar
Summary: Tina loves desperately, fiercely, with every part of herself. She falls fast and hard and doesn’t know how to hold back. She gives herself away and never asks for anything in return.





	No less for the lack of them

**Author's Note:**

> There is no dubcon in this, but there are mentions of sex and as Tina is asexual it's not the best of things for her so please be aware if that's an issue. Enjoy!

Tina loves desperately, fiercely, with every part of herself. She falls fast and hard and doesn’t know how to hold back. She gives herself away and never asks for anything in return.

She tells herself that this one, this time, this combination of hope and prayers and love will work. She pulls on the pretty silk bra with the pretty matching knickers. She slips the black dress over her head, the one with the back that drops low and the beads that dip and pool in the hollow between her breasts. She wipes her shaky eyeliner clean. Breathes. Draws it again.

When she looks in the mirror she smiles and tells herself that it isn’t false advertising and she isn’t a fraud because this time, _this time_ she’ll go through with it.

It’s just a matter of confidence.

_You look beautiful,_ he tells her when she meets him by the door. She raises an eyebrow in challenge and adds the tiniest of sway to her steps just to watch the way his eyes catch on the curve of her hips.

_I know,_ she says, cocky and flirty and nervous. Beautiful has never been the part she struggles with.

He laughs. Her smile relaxes into something genuine. He offers her his arm as they walk down the steps and their conversation turns to her job, his art, their plans to put the world to rights. He is kind and he is a dreamer and he holds her hand like something precious and with every fibre of her being, Tina loves him.

It isn’t enough.

Dinner is delicious, but the dessert is soured by anticipation. She pours another glass of wine and his gaze lingers on the curve of her throat as she swallows. Her heart jumps, and she tells herself it’s fine, it’s going to be fine, she will _make_ it be fine.

It’s her body. She can use it how she wants.

They stumble through the door, half too tipsy and half too wrapped up in each other to walk straight. She kisses like she means it. He mumbles bitten-off curses between each breath and calls her gorgeous, hot, does she know what she does to him -

(she knows and she’s terrified of it but she’s been called a tease too many times to back out now)

They fall into bed too fast. It knocks the breath out of her. Her heart hammers, but it’s excitement, she tells herself. It’s only excitement.

_You ready?_ he asks, grinning, laughing, running his hands down her like he can’t stop.

Denial sticks in her throat and the words won’t come. She forces herself to nod. She loves him, she reminds herself. She can make it work.

He hesitates. _You’re sure?_ he asks again. _Baby girl, you’re sure? We don’t have to._

Take a breath. Eyes on the target. Keep your head. Smile.

_I’m sure,_ she says, flashing a coy smirk. She repeats it in her head. I’m sure. I’m sure. I’m sure i’m sure i’m sure i’m -

It _hurts_. She’s dry, muscles tense, too focused on being relaxed to be anything but wound too tight. He moves like an invading force for all he tries to be gentle and she keeps as still as she dares and doesn’t cry. There’s nothing intimate about it. People say it’s about sharing, about coming together and expressing your love but Tina’s love is too fierce and too stubborn and it’s driving her to swallow her tears and hold on through the agony of being torn apart -

_You ok, baby girl?_

She fixes her teeth in a savage grin and lies.

When it’s done, when he’s gone, she picks up her dress from the bedroom floor and threads the straps over the arms of the hanger, careful to make the beads sit straight. She doesn’t look at the girl in the mirror.

She isn’t surprised when he doesn’t call.

She hides in the ugliest jeans, the baggiest sweater, the scarf wrapped twice round her pretty _pretty_ face so no one can see and no one can expect anything from her that she doesn’t know how to give. She thought that if she just tried harder she could make it work. She thought that if she did it a few times it was supposed to stop hurting. She thought that if she found the right person she’d understand what attraction meant.

_I don’t get it,_ she tells the dishevelled mess in the mirror. _I loved him. I thought that was meant to be enough._

She takes today to fall apart. Tomorrow, she’ll pull herself back together again. Sometime in the future she’ll meet someone else and she’ll fall fast and hard and not know how to hold any of herself back. She’ll love desperately, recklessly, until it breaks her. She’ll fall apart again.

She’ll keep doing it until someone sees her and says, _You’re ok._

She’ll offer parts of herself that she doesn’t have to give away until someone looks at her and says, _You’re enough._

She’ll twist herself into a mould that doesn’t fit until someone smiles at her and says, _You’re fine the way you are._

Until someone takes her hand and says, _You’re worthy of being loved._

Until someone opens the door and says, _You’re not the only one._

Until someone leads her to the dancing crowd and says, _You’re just like us._

Until Tina catches her reflection in the mirror and grins at it, because the hardest person she’s ever loved is herself but she’s fallen hard and fast and she’s never going to stop. Love is acceptance and beds are for lazy mornings with coffee and books; she pairs her flirty dresses with bruised knuckles from the times she says no and has to prove she means it; attraction comes in many forms and of all the things she’s attracted to nakedness has never been one of them.

She wraps herself in her flag and drapes it like armour, and all around her people are wearing the same purple-grey-black stripes with pride. They’re her protection, her get out of jail free card, the validation for her existence; they’re the reason she’s allowed to be pretty and she’s allowed to fall in love, and she’s allowed to say that she doesn’t like sex but she likes spending time with whoever the _fuck_ she likes and she’s allowed to _be._

Tina is a girl that loves desperately, fiercely, with every part of herself. None of those parts are sexual.

She doesn’t love any less for the lack of them.


End file.
